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Wear: Scoffing at Texas tolls to carry less cost starting in March

Wear: Scoffing at Texas tolls to carry less cost starting in March

Vehicles travel north on Toll road 130 from U.S. 290 on Thursday, January, 25, 2018. The TxDOT shutdown on toll projects includes, it appears, expanding existing toll projects using only toll revenue to do it. TxDOT in early December got bids for widening Texas 130 from four to six lanes from Texas 45 North in Pflugerville to U.S. 290, and the low bid was under TxDOT's estimate. But the Texas Transportation Commission, averse to toll projects suddenly given official distaste for them from Abbott and Patrick, pulled the project from its December agenda. RICARDO B. BRAZZIELL / AMERICAN-STATESMAN

People who choose to drive on Texas tollways without paying are about to get a big break.

Make that, on some Texas tollways. More on that below.

As first reported by KXAN, the NBC affiliate in Austin, the Texas Department of Transportation fines for ignoring toll bills on March 1 will go from “My God!” level to “Meh,” thanks to laws passed by the 2017 Legislature. And even the huge outstanding bills — the ones for tolls ignored over the past decade of TxDOT tolling and sometimes multiplied into the thousands of dollars by fees and fines — could be discounted or even forgiven.

TxDOT hasn’t decided what to do about that lingering, $1.47 billion-plus accounts receivable situation.

And thanks to the Legislature, the bills due from now on (for tolls accrued after March 1 and not paid) will be much smaller.